Page 41 of Always You (A Lilac Bay Novel)

“Yes, Andrew. Seeing as how I’ve known these people my entire life, I’m pretty sure I can guess how they’ll act.” I watched his profile for a long moment. He was grimacing slightly against the wind, but he looked happy, carefree. The way he always did out on the water. Hell, the way he pretty much did all of the time. “That’s why I nominatedyou, ass. I was hoping you would help me.”

He shook his head. “It’s not my thing, Riley. You know that.”

“Why? You were more than happy to help me put the application together.”

His eyes flickered over to mine. “That was different.”

“Why? Why is helping me any different than helping the town?”

He shrugged. “Because you don’t make a big deal out of it. You don’t expect anything from it.”

“And the town would?”

He snorted. “Of course they would. I would never hear the end of it. My grandmother would bring it up every time she saw me, how proud she was that I'd finally decided to get involved. And my mom would do the same. My dad would be even better, because he would make sure to always add that he never really thought I had it in me.” He made a face. “Sorry if none of that sounds very fun to me.”

“Have you ever thought that they wouldn’t make such a big deal out of you getting involved if you did it more than every once in a blue moon?”

This time when he turned to look at me, his eyes were flashing. “Drop it, Riley.”

“Andrew, it’s silly. You’re so good at so many things and—”

“I said to drop it.”

I sighed, looking away from him out to the bay at my right, the mainland a greenish-gray line in the distance. We’d had this argument before, of course. It was, by far, the thing that frustrated me most about my best friend. He took the expectations of his family so personally, and I could never understand why. They were crazy about him, every one of them. Sure, his dad might be a little demanding at times, but all you had to do was watch the way Frank Powell looked at his two sons to know that he loved them. I wondered if Andrew had any idea how lucky he was.

We made the rest of the ride in silence. Andrew kept close to the shoreline, hoping to avoid the worst of the wind. Soon we had left the town far behind, the scenery of the island to our left giving way from shops and hotels to neighborhood streets and then farms and, eventually, the thick rocky forests of the western part of the island. Andrew came in even closer to the shore so he wouldn’t miss the miniscule inlet that served the few residences down here. A gray dock jutted out from a small clearing, a gravel road stretching off into the woods.

We tied up at the dock and Andrew jumped out, holding out a hand to help me from the boat. His fingers were icy—he’d forgotten his mittens again—but he squeezed my hand briefly before letting go, a sign that I was forgiven.

I was glad for the implied permission not to worry about our argument. I had enough worries swirling through my mind as we made our way up the gravel road though the trees. After a few hundred yards it intersected with State Highway 335 coming in from town. It was kind of strange to have a highway that no one was allowed to drive on, but this bit of asphalt was maintained by the state for emergency vehicle access. It had the distinction of being the least traveled road in the state, and it would have been a thirty-minute walk from town to this point, through a lot of hills and rocky forests. I was grateful Andrew suggested the boat.

We passed Lester’s rundown looking farm and a few small clapboard houses. This was my mother’s neighborhood, way out here in the middle of nowhere, far from prying eyes of neighbors. Far from her daughters.

We both paused in front of the double wide, looking up at its facade.

It looked about the same as the last time I was here, three weeks ago now. The yard was neat, the garbage cans stacked against the garage, her bike leaning against the light blue siding. Nothing about this house advertised the unhappy memories I had experienced inside.

This wasn’t the house that I had grown up in. We'd lost that place, the little brick ranch down the street from the Powells, a few years after my dad died. A few years after my mom stopped being able to take care of us.

“You okay?” Andrew asked.

I sighed, shaking my arms out to my sides a little, as if I was about to start a race, not walk into my mother’s house. “Sure.”

He followed me up the gravel walkway. She had planted tulips once, and though I was pretty sure she hadn’t done much to them in several seasons, a few had managed to survive, pushing their green heads up through the dirt. There was probably a metaphor in there somewhere, but I was feeling too sick about going in think about it.

I knocked on the door. I could hear the TV from here, not blaring but loud enough to carry through the thin walls. I tried again.

“Mom?”

When she still didn’t answer I sighed and pulled my keys from my pocket, telling myself not to worry.She’s just asleep. Or too drunk to hear you over the TV. Nothing bad is waiting in there.

I told myself that, but it was a lot harder to believe it.

She wasn’t on the couch when I opened the door, and my fear kicked up a notch. The room was messy, as I had expected it to be, a pizza box and a few Chinese cartons on the table.

“At least she’s eating,” I muttered. Maybe if I talked I wouldn’t be able to hear the panicked whispers in my head. Maybe if I moved, if I acted, I would stop the certainty that this time, I wouldn’t find her passed out. That this time it would be worse.

Andrew flipped off the TV as I moved into the kitchen. I knew it was more likely that I would find her in her bedroom, but I was a coward. It was dark back there and I had no idea what I might find. So instead I walked into the relatively bright kitchen. Dishes were stacked in the sink, crumbs all over the counter. Definitely not the worst I had ever seen it, but not as clean as Rebecca claimed it to have been last week.